Difficulty with Happiness

[SnoopDogg23]

Aside from the existential matters this topic raises , I must say I feel like I'm missing something, or the game design is missing something, in the Ancient Era. This is my first time playing in a while, and although it used to happen to me, it seemed more acute in this game.

Starting as Deganawida leading the Incas, I was able to build 3 cities quickly. Then, my cities started to become simply overwhelmed with unhappiness. This, of course, creates a terrible ripple effect that plagues your civilization's science, production and growth. From many years of playing, I know that the only way to solve the issue generally when it occurs is to discover or adopt a religion. But, due to the unhappiness plague, I couldn't found a religion fast enough. (Difficulty being switched back and forth between Noble and Prince).

The other thing I noticed was that the negative 1/3 penalties to gold and science really force you out of the Barter system and into Slavery immediately. This exacerbates the unhappiness plague.

Yes, graveyards and walls help, but this matter is more severe, especially since you can't get to those buildings without running into this plague.

How do you avoid this problem, especially on prince or higher difficulty? Not to mention, I think the human player should be able to found a religion. It's awesome to get those buildings and benefits. The game is simply not as fun without being able to found a religion.

Am I missing something here??

Snoop

 

[<Nexus>]

What's your map size?

3 cities are pretty much in the early game on smaller maps.
Both number of cities (less is better) and cities distance from capital (closer is better) has a great impact on your overall happiness. So early expansion is no longer a very good idea, which is... a good idea as a human player can no longer capture all the valuable land before the AI
By time those penalties will decrease or will have less effect.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

It's working as intended. Main reason why it's so easy to win is that you can expand without any problem very early. Now you have to do it carefully as it was years ago, especially if using Revolutions. But as game is going on, you'll see it's not so hard.

 

[gay_Aleks]

Somewhere at Monarchy the happiness problem subsides. As for Slavery...well, I persist through the entire Ancient Era with Barter. Yeah, it sucks. But with REV and the random Slavery revolt event, you can really get screwed. So, basically, you need to bear until Coinage.

 

[nionios]

There's something controversial about unhappiness and empire size:
at the beginning of your empire when it's still small you get serious unhappiness penalty due to empire size but when your empire becomes really large (or even huge) at the modern era and a bit earlier then the size isn't a problem because there's a huge margin between happiness and unhappiness for the vast majority of your cities.
I'm talking about noble difficulty,normal speed and revs ON.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

There's something controversial about unhappiness and empire size:
at the beginning of your empire when it's still small you get serious unhappiness penalty due to empire size but when your empire becomes really large (or even huge) at the modern era and a bit earlier then the size isn't a problem because there's a huge margin between happiness and unhappiness for the vast majority of your cities.
I'm talking about noble difficulty,normal speed and revs ON.

It's intended. A huge empire in ancient era should be pretty small in modern. I think you consider small an empire of 3-4 cities in ancient on a large map. On the contrary, it's rather big. Controlling an empire the size of half Europe in ancient should be rather difficult. You should be able to manage it starting from classical.

 

[nionios]

It's intended. A huge empire in ancient era should be pretty small in modern. I think you consider small an empire of 3-4 cities in ancient on a large map. On the contrary, it's rather big. Controlling an empire the size of half Europe in ancient should be rather difficult. You should be able to manage it starting from classical.

I think you're right about the ancient era.
On the other hand I consider the unhappiness penalty to be worthless in industrial era and afterwards.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I think you're right about the ancient era.
On the other hand I consider the unhappiness penalty to be worthless in industrial era and afterwards.

Unhappiness penalty for empire size is one thing, but you also get a distance from capital unhappiness, which is pretty important up to industrial included for cities very far or on other continents. For example on an earth map it's somewhat difficult to have happy cities in America for a European civ, which sounds reasonable to me. On the other hand, starting from modern, size should only be a problem for empires stretching over half of the world or more. I actually would make it even harder but I know there are people who like overexpanding so I haven't pushed unhappiness too far.

 

[SnoopDogg23]

What's your map size?

3 cities are pretty much in the early game on smaller maps.
Both number of cities (less is better) and cities distance from capital (closer is better) has a great impact on your overall happiness. So early expansion is no longer a very good idea, which is... a good idea as a human player can no longer capture all the valuable land before the AI
By time those penalties will decrease or will have less effect.

See, I actually have the found the opposite to always be true in AND: If I don't claim the land in the ancient or classical era, the AI will do so. They had at least as many cities for each civ as I did at all times in the Ancient Era (6-7 by Classical). I'm playing on 5 continents, SmartMap, Huge size and 16 Civs. You have to lay claim to the land, or the AI will win. What am I missing here? The last thing you want is to have to go to war in Classical/Medieval against an AI that has 5 cities more than you.

This brings up another point: I don't see the AI (even those without religions) having crippling unhappiness issues like the human player does (again I'm looking at Noble-Prince difficulty).

This is a big deal for me, as I've always grappled with the expansion issue in the Ancient and Classical Eras.

Thanks,
Snoop

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

See, I actually have the found the opposite to always be true in AND: If I don't claim the land in the ancient or classical era, the AI will do so. They had at least as many cities for each civ as I did at all times in the Ancient Era (6-7 by Classical). I'm playing on 5 continents, SmartMap, Huge size and 16 Civs. You have to lay claim to the land, or the AI will win. What am I missing here? The last thing you want is to have to go to war in Classical/Medieval against an AI that has 5 cities more than you.

This brings up another point: I don't see the AI (even those without religions) having crippling unhappiness issues like the human player does (again I'm looking at Noble-Prince difficulty).

This is a big deal for me, as I've always grappled with the expansion issue in the Ancient and Classical Eras.

Thanks,
Snoop

Then try an easier handicap level or use Flexible difficulty. Noble and prince are probably harder than you remember after all the changes we've done. It's definitely harder to expand. Try new strategies.

 

[SnoopDogg23]

Then try an easier handicap level or use Flexible difficulty. Noble and prince are probably harder than you remember after all the changes we've done. It's definitely harder to expand. Try new strategies.

Oh interesting. I didn't realize that Noble and Prince have been altered even more. Am I correct that Noble is still a zero bonus difficulty for AI and Human? Are there any other aspects of Noble to be aware of?

Also, I'd like to, of course, improve my Civ-playing abilities. How do you recommend dealing with the unhappiness issue? Building three strong cities and beelining for a religion, followed by monarchy? With war to follow to gain more land? That seems to be one of the few ways to do it.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Oh interesting. I didn't realize that Noble and Prince have been altered even more. Am I correct that Noble is still a zero bonus difficulty for AI and Human? Are there any other aspects of Noble to be aware of?

Also, I'd like to, of course, improve my Civ-playing abilities. How do you recommend dealing with the unhappiness issue? Building three strong cities and beelining for a religion, followed by monarchy? With war to follow to gain more land? That seems to be one of the few ways to do it.

Too many options to give a general suggestion. But yes, I usually beeline for a religion. How many cities depends on map size. First cities I found are not far from my capital. Monarchy can help with happiness. At first I build happiness buildings as soon as I can and I try to gain resources granting happiness. I'm not a warmonger so I avoid war as long as I can except for strategic resources grabbing.

As for handicap, I can't check but I think there's no real 0 bonus level for AI, if I recall correctly. Anyway between warlord and Noble, that's the best choice to avoid most bonuses or penalties for AI.

 

[<Nexus>]

See, I actually have the found the opposite to always be true in AND: If I don't claim the land in the ancient or classical era, the AI will do so. They had at least as many cities for each civ as I did at all times in the Ancient Era (6-7 by Classical). I'm playing on 5 continents, SmartMap, Huge size and 16 Civs. You have to lay claim to the land, or the AI will win. What am I missing here? The last thing you want is to have to go to war in Classical/Medieval against an AI that has 5 cities more than you.

This brings up another point: I don't see the AI (even those without religions) having crippling unhappiness issues like the human player does (again I'm looking at Noble-Prince difficulty).

This is a big deal for me, as I've always grappled with the expansion issue in the Ancient and Classical Eras.

Thanks,
Snoop

Try reducing the number of starting civs. I usually halve it so still there is enough place to expand in the ancient era and usually in classical too. I don't like it when the world is crowded from the beginning.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

you don't need to found a religion, you just need to ADOPT a religion to gain the religious bonuses.

Granted you may get some -ve effects, if holy city is controlled by a civ of another religion, but you could always switch to a state run religion of the same holy city.

Anyway, you CAPTURE and adopt religion, not found religions. Founding is just a bonus.

 

[quikesan]

I try to gain resources granting happiness

sorry to revive this thread, but after having started playing again since long ago, I am playing again and I have encountered the same problems SnoopDogg23 has.

As you suggest, I always try to find resources that gives happiness bonus, but I have found that now those have been servery crippled in the Ancient era.
Now, only pearls and jewels give happiness bonus in Ancient era. The rest of that kind: gold, silver, ivory, fur, just doesn't.
The rest, such as Dye, Incense and so on, need Calendar to be exploited, which is pretty advance in the tech tree.

If the problem is making it realistic, I don't really understand why having access to gold or silver should not give you the happiness bonus. Specially when pearls and gems do.

I think it would make sense that you need a particular building to get the happiness bonus from those resources, but taking it all apart I think is unrealistic, and cripples the starting of the game too much.

In the game I am playing in a Gigantic map, in the turn 100/900, I have 5 cities, only one having the "we are to far from the capital" malus, while the AI have 6 o 7, and my civ has become completely unmanageable due to unhappiness.
unhappiness leads to unproductivity, that leads to bankruptcy, that leads to disbanded units, that leads to be an easy target, that means destruction...

I will keep trying, but I have the feeling that those luxury resources not giving happiness bonus now cripples the start too much.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

I play gigantic maps, you always start off slow and smaller. Don't sweat it.

Develop you capital and 3/4 other cities to the max at pop 4/5.

You'll find they can increase the happy cap gradually, and before you know it, its exploded.

Its just more of a challenge, build up you cities, boost science and commerce. The AI is only developing the future lands of your empire.

I can still get to a continental empire by about 1500 AD now, down from my previous 'slowest' time of 1000 AD.

Its more of a challenge, and keeps me enthralled after 4 or 5 years of playing this MOD.

 

[robbyextreme]

sorry to revive this thread, but after having started playing again since long ago, I am playing again and I have encountered the same problems SnoopDogg23 has.

As you suggest, I always try to find resources that gives happiness bonus, but I have found that now those have been servery crippled in the Ancient era.
Now, only pearls and jewels give happiness bonus in Ancient era. The rest of that kind: gold, silver, ivory, fur, just doesn't.
The rest, such as Dye, Incense and so on, need Calendar to be exploited, which is pretty advance in the tech tree.

If the problem is making it realistic, I don't really understand why having access to gold or silver should not give you the happiness bonus. Specially when pearls and gems do.

I think it would make sense that you need a particular building to get the happiness bonus from those resources, but taking it all apart I think is unrealistic, and cripples the starting of the game too much.

In the game I am playing in a Gigantic map, in the turn 100/900, I have 5 cities, only one having the "we are to far from the capital" malus, while the AI have 6 o 7, and my civ has become completely unmanageable due to unhappiness.
unhappiness leads to unproductivity, that leads to bankruptcy, that leads to disbanded units, that leads to be an easy target, that means destruction...

I will keep trying, but I have the feeling that those luxury resources not giving happiness bonus now cripples the start too much.

Well you can always just add a happy bonus to those resources yourself in it's xml file. I don't agree with it because the mod encourages building happiness early game with several different buildings.

I think in most games slavery and despotism need to be avoided. Growing and expanding in the early game isn't that important it seems in this mod. A good change of pace from the original game since before getting a good early lead just secures you a win, and you spend a couple hours finishing everyone off. Got really boring.

 

[Kepling]

The way I deal with unhappiness in the ancient era is to keep the population in all my cites low(Under 6, more like 2-3) until I get Monarchy for the civic. Even after that point I try to keep my populations limited so I can avoid espionage fomenting unhappiness and poisoning my water with a happiness and health buffer. For the most part I'll use the town hall and city council as reference points for when I'll start to grow my cities to 6 and 13 retrospectively, given they have enough health and happiness to not allow spies to tear me apart from the inside.

As a mainly espionage player I watch my opponents cities closely, and when I'm at 6 population in most of my cities they'll have size 13 cities with happiness and health problems. I exploit this to its fullest and tear them apart from the inside. Obviously this isn't an issue for most of Ancient unless an opponent gets alphabet early, but is something to consider. If you see "Poisoned Water" or "People are telling us of your villainy" in your city you may have spy problems, but honestly IMO the AI doesn't use spies enough.



In regards to the founding of religions, what typically happens to me is when I play with the setting that allows barbs to spawn new civs they will spawn in with multiple cities(like 7 when you have 2 or 3) and all the techs from a fraction of the players(not a fraction of the techs known by all players, I thought this at first). Obviously this can give them an advantage in beelining religions. I need to play with this myself a little more, but the 2 settings you're likely looking for are in the BUG menu under RevDMC:

Min City Pop-Max this to 12 so barbs won't spawn civs until you found your religion, drop it back down afterwards.

-or-

BarbTech Fraction-Drop this to 0 so the barbs don't get techs when spawning new civs, raise it back afterwards.

This won't guarantee you founding a religion, but it will prevent you losing it cheaply.

Try reducing the number of starting civs. I usually halve it so still there is enough place to expand in the ancient era and usually in classical too. I don't like it when the world is crowded from the beginning.

This could prove a double edged sword depending on the settings you choose, namely raging barbs. What typically happens to me is there are less "sponges" to soak up barbs and they clump together. Those barb events from BTS are a cakewalk compared to a 100 unit strong stack of barbs barreling down on you out of nowhere.